Wednesday, December 3, 2008

The Dawgs played well last night but fell in Bowling Green, KY last night to a pretty good Western Kentucky team, 67-63. Daugman does a nice job of breaking it down here, and I pretty much concur with everything he said (as usual.) Other than that, here's what I saw:

POSITIVES

Woodbury might be finding his stroke. 7-18 from the floor isn't exactly lighting it up, but he had a couple of hot stretches in the game that I've been waiting to see all year. I've been saying all along, as T.Wood goes, so goes this season. He's the most dynamic scoring option UGA has.

Thompkins and Leslie both looked very strong in limited stretches, especially in the first half.

Corey Butler, once again. For the same reasons he is always a positive.

Barnes was a monster at times last night. He was ferocious on the boards and did a good job of getting to the foul line (although he needs to be better than 3-6 from the charity stripe.)

Defense was good with the exception of 2 big runs by WKU. Felton's 1-3-1 can be stifling at times.

NEGATIVES

Thompkins and Leslie, 17 and 14 minutes respectively. I know Thompkins is still getting his legs, but doesn't he have to be in the game all the way down the stretch? I know he had some foul problems in this game, but I swear sometimes CDF forgets some guys are on the roster. (Drazen?)

Point guard play was really bad last night. Swansey had 4 turnovers vs 3 assists. Ware did a better job handling the ball, but offset that with a 1-7 shooting night and some questionable shots in the last 10 minutes of the game.

Based on the above, far more positives than negatives. All in all it wasn't a bad night, except for the final result. WKU is a good team that will probably be back in the Dance again this season. What I like, is that we are seeing improvement with this team. Once things start coming together in all facets (Thompkins 100% healthy, more experienced ball handling, etc.), I'm confident we'll see the wins pile up this season.

4 comments:

Realistically, I'm expecting something in the middle. I'll say 18-13 overall, 8-8 in the SEC. Not really on the NCAA bubble, more like an NIT berth. We could win the SEC tournament again this year though.

I just can not take as many positives from that game.I don't think that WKU was anything other a average basketball team(nothing close to last yr).First of all our point guard play was not bad but horrible. As the most important position on the court we are in for a long yr at this position unless Ware grows up in a hurry. Zac is a liability plain and simple. I know I am in the minority but It is what it is.CDF's staple is M2M D.....if your 1 can't stay in front of the other teams 1 you got problems that lead to wide open layups or jumpers. I am not talking about his A/T ratio (which is suspect) but his lack of foot speed is a liability.We still run the worst O in D1. Ware and Barnes had a nice pick and roll going in the second but our O is painful to watch. TWood played better but was nowhere to be found when we needed him the most. Leslie and HT3 should be on the court more (really the only two positives I found in the game) and Drazen never left the bench(wtf CDF???).

I could go on and on but won't.... we just need to improve and fast. Will we split between Ill and Vtech? Plus our first 4 games in the SEC are murders row......... not trying to peepee on anyones cornflakes but the bball team has a long way to go. I'll be there to support them and watch them improve but I hope we don't dig ourselves too big a hole early on.